Then the snuff criminals break in to his father’s Mac and by trick-phoning discover the family address. Or else.Īs his parents bicker – Gaynor Faye’s Kellie Bryce joins the fray – Max heedlessly breaks in to Scarab Productions. They’re then warned they’re not subscribers, to desist. Tom and his younger son Max (Luke Ward-Wilkinson) look on helplessly as Jamie dies. Boakye morphs from slinky to viscerally terrified. Only this time Janie finds herself the victim of a snuff movie with her throat slashed. This is the warehouse setting where Natalie Boakye’s escort girl Janie (struggling student lawyer paying off student debt) meets Mylo McDonald’s masked Mick, whom she’s entertained before. A curtain backstage flutters occasionally.Ībove it’s a stark, stronger set: atmospherically all murk chains and oil. Below is a sort of offcut MFI kitchen with plush fittings though overall it’s a little too shoddy for us to believe an American wants to hire its creator. Max Pappenheim’s sound and composition is either a note of effective shlock, ring-tones, or a fug of thriller low-bass. Very pacily directed by Jonathan O’Boyle, it’s lit by Jason Taylor with different levels for the gantry above, and an evenly-lit interior below, including a slide-in police station downstage left. What he then sees is in fact the first scene of the play. It’s what Adam Woodyatt’s Tom Bryce discovers as he inserts a lost memory stick in his Mac to discover the owner’s identity to send it on. Looking Good Dead is on the face of it a parable of ‘no good deed goes unpunished’. In this production Grace and his team are slightly recessed, and it’s the Bryce family foregrounded.

Clearly the script’s been brought locally and nationally up to date. There’s references to Archipelagos restaurant (Western Road, Hove End, north side), and PPI. Theatre Royal Brighton is of course James’ home, and Brighton-based Commander Roy Grace its resident detective. Quite apart from his warning voiceover about the fate of those who don’t switch off their mobiles. You might find out just how charming he’s being. Peter James charmingly introduces his latest adaptation Looking Good Dead – already a screenplay, though this theatre version is by Shaun McKenna. Production Manager Tamsin Rose, Costume Supervisor Chrissy Maddison, Props Supervisor Robyn Hardy, CSM Nick Earle, DSM Linnea Friden Grønning, TSM Pippa Kay, Wardrobe David Morgan.

It’s lit by Jason Taylor with Max Pappenheim’s sound and composition. Directed by Jonathan O’Boyle, Michael Holt’s set is on a split level. Adapted by Shaun McKenna from Peter James’ novel.

Looking good dead review